Carol Baxter
It's rare to see a yawn from her spellbound audiences. It's more common to hear a groan, then a laugh, then a clap when she leaves her audiences hanging with the words: "All will be revealed ... in tomorrow's session."
These three talks tell the true story of The Fabulous Flying Mrs Miller, Australia's first internationally-famous female aviator, who was also a close friend of Amelia Earhart. Carol's book is being turned into a TV series called The Aviatrix.
Why haven't you heard of Mrs Miller? All will be revealed in these talks.
Bored 1920s Australian housewife Jessie Miller, who is holidaying in London, decides to join World War I aviator, Bill Lancaster, in his attempt at a record-setting flight from England to Australia. She hopes to become the first woman to travel halfway around the world by air. But aloft in their open-cockpit biplane, events soon spiral out of control.
Australia’s first internationally famous aviatrix, Jessie Miller, travels to America in 1928, where she becomes a record-setting celebrity aviator, the world's first female test pilot, and a close friend of Amelia Earhart. Then one day she disappears ...
As the Great Depression grips America, celebrity aviator Jessie Miller finds herself the world’s most notorious scarlet woman and a central player in a sensational American murder trial.
This two-part mini-series tells the extraordinary story of the ship that changed the course of Ireland's history.
In 1875, a group of Irish-born Americans plot to help Ireland throw off the yoke of British oppression. Their plan to liberate Irish political prisoners from the Western Australian penal colony is both audacious and perilous. Could it possibly succeed?
The American whaler Catalpa docks in Western Australia in 1876 on a secret mission to liberate Irish political prisoners from under the noses of their British captors. But nothing goes according to plan.
These two talks tell the story of the American ghost ship that became one of the world's greatest maritime mysteries.
In November 1872, the now-famous American brigantine Mary Celeste sails from New York for Italy carrying eight crew members, two passengers, and a cargo of alcohol. It's soon found abandoned in the Atlantic Ocean. What did the investigators discover?
After the Mary Celeste is found abandoned in the Atlantic Ocean in 1872, it soon becomes one of the world's greatest maritime mysteries. After 150 years of theories, speculations and outrageous claims, can we determine what really happened to the passengers and crew?
In 1787, Britain sends the First Fleet across the world's oceans to establish penal settlements in New South Wales and Norfolk Island. Soon these new outposts of the British empire are plunged into a life-threatening crisis.
In 1978, US pilot Jay Prochnow sets off from San Francisco to ferry a Cessna crop-duster to Sydney. During the flight, his navigation system fails, leaving him lost over the Pacific Ocean as darkness falls and his fuel tanks empty. Can a nearby Air New Zealand DC-10 save him?
In 1937, the world’s most famous aviatrix, Amelia Earhart, sets off from New Guinea to cross the Pacific on the final leg of her world flight … and disappears. Did her empty fuel tanks force her down in the ocean? Was she off-course due to spying for the American government? Was she captured by the Japanese and forced to become the radio broadcaster Tokyo Rose? Join the history detective, Carol Baxter, as she attempts to determine what really did happen to Amelia Earhart.
As we cross the world's oceans, changing time zones along the way, join the history detective, Carol Baxter, as she investigates "time" itself and how the world ultimately came to shackle it in such a way.
London, 1845. Quaker ex-convict John Tawell attempts to rid himself of his demanding ex-mistress. He flees the scene in one of the revolutionary new railway trains. A message is sent along the revolutionary new commercial electric telegraph line, the only line in the entire world capable of sending a random message at a moment's notice. The dramatic consequences jump-start the Communication Revolution, ushering in today’s Information Age.
This talk is from Carol's book The Peculiar Case of the Electric Constable.
Join Carol Baxter on a rollicking robbing ride across New South Wales in the 1860s with outlaw Captain Thunderbolt – aka Frederick Ward aka the “gentleman bushranger” – and his feisty lover Mary Ann Bugg.
This talk is from Carol's book Captain Thunderbolt and His Lady, which is being turned into a TV series called Thunderbolt and Bugg.
Sydney, 1828. An audacious gang of convicts tunnels through a sewerage drain into the vault of the bank owned by Sydney’s wealthiest gentlemen. They steal the equivalent, in today’s terms, of twenty million dollars. Can the authorities catch the thieves, reassert their imperious authority in this penal settlement (of all places), and save the colony from a devastating economic collapse?
This talk is from Carol's book Breaking the Bank.
In 1888, the year Jack the Ripper launched himself onto the world stage, Louisa Collins finds herself in Australia's spotlight. Nicknamed "The Lucretia Borgia of Botany Bay", she is declared by some to be worse than the Ripper. But is she innocent or guilty?
This talk is from Carol's book Black Widow. Watch a video snippet from her "Black Widow" talk.